Companies offering aesthetic devices and treatments have been seeing lively action in the past couple of months from venture investors and the public markets, Tim Hay reports for VentureWire. The latest is Venus Concept USA, a company selling a range of aesthetic medical devices in 47 countries, which has raised $10 million in new funding from Longitude Capital. Venus Concept has regulatory approvals in several markets for its devices, several of which are used in treatments for the skin. Last month, Ulthera, a developer of aesthetic devices that use ultrasound to treat cellulite, filed plans to go public, and Revance Therapeutics, which makes a topical alternative to Botox injections, continues to trade high above its original asking price following its market debut earlier this month. Another venture-backed aesthetics company is Irish cosmetic implant manufacturer GC Aesthetics, which earlier this month raised $60 million from OrbiMed, Montreux Equity Partners and Oyster Capital.

ALSO IN TODAY’S VENTUREWIRE (subscription required):

Sherpaaclosed a $4 million Series A round led by Softbank Capital, Yuliya Chernova reports for VentureWire. But unlike many health-care service startups, the company is able to use the money for growth rather than sustenance.

IRhythm Technologiesraised a $17 million Series E, with new investor Novo A/S joining returning investor Norwest Venture Partners. The company, which makes a lightweight heart monitor that gives doctors reams of data about the heart, has now raised $85 million from investors.

Naveen Selvadurai, co-founder of Foursquare, will be the first partner at Expa Capital, an early-stage fund and startup studio that was started by StumbleUpon and Uber founder Garrett Camp.

ShopKeep has brought on former iQor CEONorm Merritt to be the co-CEO of the startup, which provides customer care and point-of-sales software for retail business.

Ethan Beard, a former Facebook and Google executive, joined the board of Parchment, a company that digitally delivers transcripts and other academic credentials.

TabTale, an Israeli mobile gaming and kids’ education company, has acquired Hong Kong-based Coco Play for around $1 million. The deal marks the beginning of a series of such deals designed to expand TabTale’s global footprint.

Brandwatchraised $22 million in a round led by Highland Capital Partners Europe. The company joins the already crowded field of well-funded social media analytics companies.

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ELSEWHERE AROUND THE WEB:

Uber Discusses Investment at $12 Billion Valuation. Uber is hailing a group of fund managers for a large investment that could value the startup at north of $12 billion, report the WSJ’s Evelyn Rusli, Mike Spector and Douglas MacMilland, citing people familiar with the matter. Possible investors include mutual fund BlackRock, private-equity firms General Atlantic and Technology Crossover Ventures, and hedge funds, but a deal is no sure thing.

Q&A With Accel’s New Europe Tech VC Partner Fred Destin. After a busy 24 hours that saw him jump from Atlas Venture in the U.S. to Accel Partners’ London office, Fred Destin sat down with the WSJ’s Lisa Fleisher for a talk about the European startup scene and other matters.

One-time Evernote Rival Springpad Shuts Down.Springpad, a productivity app that struggled to stand out from similar offerings from Evernote and Pinterest, is planning to close its doors, The Verge reported. The six-year-old Boston company, which raised more than $7 million, never came close to matching the momentum of Evernote.

A Win for the Patent Trolls. Patent reform legislation has suffered a blow in the Senate, which is bad news for information technology startups that “are probably spending hundreds of millions of dollars collectively on an annual basis fighting off patent trolls,” writes Union Square Ventures’ Fred Wilson, who calls these payments a “tax on innovation” and “borderline theft” that must end.

Who is Your Real Competition? Startups that insist they have no real competition may be correct, but that’s no guarantee of success, writes Chris Myers, co-founder and CEO of BodeTree, a web app for small businesses, in a post for the WSJ’s Accelerators blog. Sometimes a product just doesn’t fit the needs of customers, and it requires an honest look to figure out what a company is doing wrong.

Path–the Next Friendster? Questions of Path’s relevance and viability have been around since the company’s earliest days, but it’s become harder to slough off the serious concerns about whether Path will ever become more than a pretty but largely ignored mobile app, writes Michael Carney of PandoDaily.

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